You can still use command.com on NT/2K/XP systems and access the command prompt just fine.
(Well, it runs slightly slower, since it is the DOS emulation layer, not the true command prompt running)
My highschool uses the windows policies to disable cmd.exe. if you try to run it, it gives a message saying that "Command Prompt is disabled by the administrator"
Well, just create a batch file, run command.com and you can do most things you could do from cmd. (Well, it doesn't support the extra features the NT command processor allows, like pushd, popd, alias, etc but you don't really need those).